Ruse, Muse, Obtuse

Ahh the joy of sleep snuggled in a warm railway bunker......
AAck the jab in the back
R: "Wake up!! our stop is next"
A: Grunts
R: WAKE UP!
A: Last stop is ours (turns over and tries to sleep again)
Finally the train comes to a stop..a complete stop...the final stop
We step out and can't believe we have actually made it to Dehradoon and on TIME!!! so far so good
At the station we were accosted by several autowala's "Rickshaw madam" etc etc lots of army people walking around (surprise surprise) We walk around a lil cuz i needed to clear out my befuddled head. Though at this point i must stop and specifically talk about R in the next few line
You seen a Jack in the Box?
You seen a human jack in the Box?
Let's think of sleep as the Box
Now let me tell you that it is no exaggeration that R would be the jack!!!!I
mean seriously, if i had that gift i would'nt need to consume the bile juice disguised as coffee every single day at work.

Anyways my state of beffudleness ends quickly and we find out that the bus stop is on the way out of the station. R and I manage to potter or moossey(?) around as she likes to call it. The bus finally leaves at 7:00 am bright and early, the conductor informed us that we will reach Mussorie by 8:00 am.
The bus laboriously climbed the twisty jalebi roads and paused for a breather every now and then. We arrive at the Palace station. We get off the bus and look for a hotel. We almost settle for a cheap hotel when we find "The Clarks" It is right there on Mall road, the rooms are incredible, it was an old Raj time grocery store which the current owners bought way back in 1926. The place is pristine and extremely well maintained. OOh and did i mention that it was cheap too? R and I fell in love with the place at first sight. The owner of the place is a matronly wonderful aunty who gave us a discount since we were only girls. The room we got was awesome. It had a great view of the valley and was perfectly clean and simple.
Anyways we decide to get breakfast out of the way since I wanted to watch the Japanese Grand Prix at 10:00. We wandered around a bit, taking in the sites and sounds of the place. A good tip while in Mussoorie is that the best time to take in the view in the mall area is before 10:00 am since the tourists are not out and the place is almost empty and one can enjoy the beauty of the place at leisure and listen to the sounds of nature.We found a little place where we hogged on cheese omelets
While watching the race the valley suddenly mists up. The sky was blue as Madonna's veil all morning and suddenly it became dark and grey. We had a fun time watching the mists slowly creep into our room thru the windows. All hopes for a misty room were dashed when we were forced to close the windows because it became a little cold.
An exciting race later we headed out for lunch to Rice bowl. Which is just a hop and skip away from clarkes. it is a good chinese and Tibetan restaurant and i enjoyed my noodle soup. Then we went to Casa Mia one of the best bakeries ever. R had a lemon pie and I a rum ball. The lemon pie was awesome and the rum ball was simply the best I've ever eaten. yum yum. Both these places are just ten steps away from Clarke's.
We buy tickets for the cable car to Gun point. However the length of the queue made us head over to happy valley instead. there is a tibetian monastery there. It is a little off-beat from the main touristy places. We took a rickshaw till the start of happy valley and walked down the rest of the way to the monastery. We climbed a a little hillock, when we reached its peak we had an unhindered view of the valley. the only sounds one can hear are the flags flapping in the wind and the occasional distant sound of prayer bells. It was beautiful! We then headed to the monastery which was at the base of the hillock. This is my first time at a buddhist temple and i liked the experience.
We managed to make it back up without loosing much breath and were happy that we chose to walk as we could see so much more of the area than if we had taken a cab. We took a taxi back to the mall area. There was a huge traffic jam just before the mall road. So we walked from the library end to clarke. After a quick beak where i ate a banana slice and R a chocolate truffle we headed over to the cable car. The queue was still long but we didn't want to waste our tickets and by the time we got up there it was past dusk. We took in a few sites while there was little light had some chocolate milk and headed back down in the cable car after a long wait. Gun hill is very commercialised and the stores have blocked out a lot of views. Next time i think I'll skip the cable car and simply walk up. there early in the morning.
We had dinner at clarkes since R had read that the pasta was good there. It definitely lived up to its name. It was really good. Note that pastas have to be ordered in advance.
We walked over to tavern a restaurant which was also highly recommended but we didn't enter since a party was going on and the music was bad. Instead we were bedazzled by a little shop near tavern which specialised in Tibetan jewellery. The pieces were beautiful and very reasonable. A must stop for the ladies who like a little chunky jewellery.
We headed back to the room but not before buying an apple pie from Casa Mia. The little bakery is seriously awesome!!!!
Our first day in Mussorie was complete and we were both satisfied at having covered a significant bit. We had decided long before that we were going to avoid the touristy spots and it paid off well.
zzzzzzz